Lew Rockwell - devastating analysis

[itshappening]

Obama Targets LewRockwell.com

Posted by Lew Rockwell on May 1, 2010 11:30 AM

Well, in a sense. Here were some of his remarks today at the government University of Michigan graduation:

“It troubles me when I hear people say that all of government is inherently bad,” said Obama, who received an honorary doctor of laws degree. “For when our government is spoken of as some menacing, threatening foreign entity, it conveniently ignores the fact in our democracy, government is us.”

The government-loving AP headlines the story, “Obama Takes Direct Aim at Anti-Government Rhetoric,” and implies that Obama is talking about Palin and the Tea Parties. But the neocon Palin loves the government, as do the Tea Parties and the Republicans, even if they dissent on its current size, or actually just its current officeholders. Conservatives, liberals, neocons, socialists, communists, national socialists, social democrats, fascists, regime libertarians: all love and defend some or many aspects of government.

Who actually, in Obama’s phrase, thinks “all of government is inherently bad”? Just Rothbardian anarcho-capitalists, who are “anti-war, anti-state, pro-market,” in the LRC phrase. The state, as Obama implies, feels itself weakened by the reaction to its mass murder, mass looting, mass redistribution, and mass counterfeiting and subsequent economic depression. There has never been a state so big and so rapacious as the US, and the more people who begin to see through its propaganda, the more silly speeches to government audiences the government leader will try to give. The supremely rich taxing-killing machine is “us”? What blithering nonsense. The government is a separate, leech-like entity that lives by lies and aggression off the rest of us, and impoverishes us in the process, not to mention taking our freedom and destroying all that is good in human society. But Barack: we’re not taking it anymore. Read Murray N. Rothbard and Étienne de La Boétie if you want to know what that means.

http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/archives/56938.html

[Anti Federalist]

Not Us. Never, Ever Us.

Posted by Charles Featherstone on May 1, 2010 10:50 AM

First, I don’t hear many people — aside from the folks at this web site — saying “all of government is inherently bad.” The Tea Party folks love law enforcement and the Pentagon, war and the welfare state that war breeds, and don’t mind that taxing and spending because many of them trust it or benefit from it. (Tea Partiers only dislike government they don’t benefit from.)

But second, it’s important to emphasize again and again and again that this notion that we, the people, are in any way the government is fraudulent. The government is not us. It cannot ever be us. If it were, there’d be no need for signs that say “Property of the United States Government” with warnings to trespassers because how can citizens — who are sovereign — trespass on the property over which they are sovereign? It’s the problem of socialist property writ large, and it’s why popular sovereignty is bunkum. All human societies become societies in which a relatively tiny elite rule a majority, and democracy (along with ideology) is just modernity’s method of legitimizing that elite rule. I have compared democratic rituals to religious rituals before, and I do believe that elections are the central sacrament of democracy. A pointless sacrament of an idolatrous religion.

The truth is governments are always a menacing entity. Often times they are evil. Sometimes they are even foreign. Government is not us. And it will not ever be us.

[lynnf]

hey, Obama (or Soetoro or whoever you are). listen to this quote from the first president elected under the ratified Constitution:

"Government is not reason. It is not eloquence. Government is force; like fire it is a dangerous servant -- and a fearful master."(George Washington, 1797)."

but those of your ilk want to ignore such facts.

[ctiger2]

I love the Daily Caller addtion:

Don’t Call Me A Socialist
Obama: socialist label is like comparing the gov’t to a ‘murderous regime’

Hey Barry, IT IS a murderous regime. Just ask the rest of the world.

[jbuttell]

hey, Obama (or Soetoro or whoever you are). listen to this quote from the first president elected under the ratified Constitution:

"Government is not reason. It is not eloquence. Government is force; like fire it is a dangerous servant -- and a fearful master."(George Washington, 1797)."

but those of your ilk want to ignore such facts.

Great quote, thanks.

[FreeTraveler]

hey, Obama (or Soetoro or whoever you are). listen to this quote from the first president elected under the ratified Constitution:

"Government is not reason. It is not eloquence. Government is force; like fire it is a dangerous servant -- and a fearful master."(George Washington, 1797)."

but those of your ilk want to ignore such facts.
Can you find an actual source for that quote? It was supposedly his first inaugural address, but it's not in there.

I like the quote, but can't use it because it can't be sourced.

[BuddyRey]

Woot! Good stuff!

I get tired of that "we are all the government" nonsense too.

[Liberty Stud]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?

[tremendoustie]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?

I think he just wants governments to live by the same rules for decent behavior that we all do -- namely, that it's wrong to initiate aggressive violence against peaceful people, in order to rob them, or control their lives.

The common understanding is that "anarchy" means "no rules". But, I support rules against harming other people or their property. Defensive violence is often appropriate. So, I'm not an anarchist, at least according to that definition, and I don't believe Lew is either.

[Icymudpuppy]

Wrongly attributed to George Washington.

The quote is from an anthology of mostly unknown writers edited by Upton Sinclair.
The Cry for Justice: An Anthology of the Literature of Social Protest (1915) page. 305

[BuddyRey]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?

Yeah, I'm pretty sure he does. That's what some of us like about him. :)

[lynnf]

Can you find an actual source for that quote? It was supposedly his first inaugural address, but it's not in there.

I like the quote, but can't use it because it can't be sourced.

sorry, I can't find it on the internet. the date is given as 1797, which would put it after his farewell address. that probably means it is only listed in books and/or newspapers rather than in government records. (it wasn't in his farewell address, either).

you might try your local librarian. good luck.

lynn

[heavenlyboy34]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?


Try reading his books and articles. ;):D

[ClayTrainor]

Yeah, I'm pretty sure he does. That's what some of us like about him. :)

Yup. There are very few Austrian Economists that aren't Anarchists.

[free.alive]

Go Lew.. and yes he is!

[Mach]

Damn, this is a keeper, thanks.

The government is a separate, leech-like entity that lives by lies and aggression off the rest of us, and impoverishes us in the process, not to mention taking our freedom and destroying all that is good in human society.
- Lew Rockwell

[mikem317]

Yup. There are very few Austrian Economists that aren't Anarchists.

Peter Schiff. Mish Shedlock.

[mikem317]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?

I think Lew is an anarcho-capitalist. He also frequently posts Doug Casey's articles and Casey is a pretty prominent anarchist.

[ClayTrainor]

Peter Schiff. Mish Shedlock.

I didn't say that there were none. Ron Paul would be another.

[awake]

I think Lew is a 'The free market can provide all the things that government does' type.

[low preference guy]

Mises and Hazlitt weren't anarchists. George Reisman isn't either.

[BuddyRey]

Damn, this is a keeper, thanks.

The government is a separate, leech-like entity that lives by lies and aggression off the rest of us, and impoverishes us in the process, not to mention taking our freedom and destroying all that is good in human society.
- Lew Rockwell

That quote is worthy of being someone's RPF's signature! :D

[puppetmaster]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?


read and you will see "what Lew wants"
his rocker is fine.

[JeNNiF00F00]

Lew is slightly off his rocker. What does Lew want, total anarchy?

Its expected that you would say this about a man who believes in true Liberty, and gives Ron Paul props all the time.

[Andrew-Austin]

it conveniently ignores the fact in our democracy, government is us.


Any moron can see through this. Here's your devastating analysis:

YouTube - The Fallacy of "Representative Government" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o46OUYSw1xg&feature=player_embedded)

[BuddyRey]

Any moron can see through this. Here's your devastating analysis:

YouTube - The Fallacy of "Representative Government" (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o46OUYSw1xg&feature=player_embedded)

Great video!

[mczerone]

The more I see/read/hear from this speech, the more outraged I get. Every talking point treats governmental action as the savior and private action as evil.

He claimed that Railroads, SS, Medicare, and the highways were all great things that the govt has done "for us". He doesn't mention the absolute failure that these things are under the govt.

He suggests that without a strong regulating federal government, mine conditions would be horrible and unsafe for workers. He doesn't mention the fact that these tragedies happen under the govt's watch anyway or that private regulators have more of an incentive to provide safety than does a monopoly state regulator.

He suggests that it was too little govt regulation that allowed "Wall St." to bust. He doesn't mention the aggressive tax breaks that misdirected the economy, the horrible financial regulations that pushed investment to ever more obfuscatory devices built on leverage that was propped up by govt-insured Fannie and Freddy, the fact that the Fed Reserve distorts the money supply to give firms false accountings, or the fact that it was the policy of both parties to hand the irresponsible losers billions of dollars to try to save favored institutions.

He claims that "the govt" is "us". He doesn't mention that if that were true, "we" wouldn't need a huge D.C. bureaucracy to administer our own damned decisions.

This guy is either horribly misinformed or is horribly misinforming those who unquestioningly listen to him. Either way, I think that it goes to show that I m not govt, and govt does what it does despite me.

[mczerone]

Obama claimed that the govt is the roads, and the speed limits that keep us safe. He never mentioned that roads funded by govt are poorly maintained, poorly managed, resulting from much eminent domain takings, that the Federal 55mph speed limit was not enacted for safety, but to reduce consumption as a result of the rationing due to federal oil policy, or that many private roads do much better in terms of meeting the safety and travel demands of consumers than public highways.

I wish this guy would take some time to learn the opposite side of his big-government mantra, and learn that all these victories that he is claiming on behalf of govt and nothing but clear defeats by any rational measure.

That being said, he should also take the time to see that the growing opposition to govt is embracing peace, and it is his own 'good govt' that relies on the violent means to win arguments. I don't wish Barack Obama any harm, but I wish to see his plunderous system exposed and dismantled.

[awake]

There are only two classes that anyone needs to concern themselves with. The rulers and the ruled - Slave owners in degrees and serfs.

The rulers/looters play a funny little game of convincing the masses - the ruled - that they actually are in control of the government. Reality hits much harder though, we have a steady stream of caretakers looting the wealth of the world.